Two Years Before Nineteen Years Later
by Quietlovingman
Summary: In the Wold as Myth, The Circle patrols the multiverse fighting against black hats and Authors to bring peace and joy to all. In most worlds, The Story is complete and unchangeable, but every once in a great while an Author will leave the door open for changes. Two years before the linear end of a series, one Author stated that her written ending was not what she would write now..
1. Chapter 1

Disclamer: I do not own JKR's Harry Potter, or RAH's Future History

Two years before Nineteen Years Later.

Aboard the Hyperspace Cruiser 'Dora'

Four redheads man the deck of the ship. Twins In formal "un-dress" the only thing to differentiate between them is the captain's insignia stuck to the shoulders of the one in the command chair vs. the _lieutenant's_i nsignia on the other. A second set of near twin's man the science and observation monitors. Or at least that is the illusion they are portraying. In reality, the ship is run completely by the Artificial Intelligence that is the Autopilot, nav-comp, and Nanny for the crew "Dora"

Despite the fact that they are only nominally in charge of the ship, it is fun to spend the day "On Deck" rather than relaxing in the lounge or the refresher. Currently the Dora was on an exploratory mission into an area of the multi-verse unreachable before now. The new and improved Burroughs Continua device machined by the high powered duo of Pallas Athena and Mycroft Holmes; the twin AI computers that run _Tellus Tertius _; had a degree of precision that allowed for access to10,314,424,798,490,535,546,171,949,056, universes as opposed to the 46,656, the hand machined device could access. Though once in a given universe it was possible that the number of accessible universes would include a different set than the one from the home universe.

The installation of the continua device replacing the hyper drive saved a bit on power as it used about as much power as one of the old Libby Light pressure Drives. The extra power and space was used to upgrade the Dora's processing power a bit, she was now almost on par with the Planetary computers that were a large part of her family.

Being in one of the main origin universes in the early 21st century the girls were on a mission to send out invitations to the _Centennial Convention of the Interuniversal Society for Eschatological Pantheistic Multiple-Ego Solipsism_. Many Authors works in the late 20th century and early 21st century were popular enough that their universes had become accessible using the old device. You see, the device though limited tends to deposit users into their favorite fictional worlds… Émile Borel 's Infinite typist generating the complete works of Shakespeare is only one example of the mathematically complex models of infinity, but the solipsistic quirk means that the universes we find are our own when searching randomly.

In fact it was this realization that lead Hilda Corners Burroughs to found the Society to begin reaching out to the multiverse publicly and through the _Circle of Ouroboros _more privately.

In the final decade of the 20th century in this universe the information age had finally begun. High speed high powered networked computers sharing megabytes and gigabytes of data had spread to most if not all of the developed world. This had happened anywhere from 40 to 100 years earlier in some of the more popular universes, but this world had little to write home about, and contained a preponderance of writers. This glut of writers and the ability to disseminate unrefined works quickly via the internet had created a nexus of sorts. You see, normally only "Cannon" universes were available to the Continua craft, however the upgrade provided by the more precise tooling allowed for access to the more popular "Fannon" universes. Worlds inspired by great authors but changed to suit the whims of a reader and then devoured by like minded readers fanning the flames of altered reality. When enough readers internalize a fannon world, it too becomes accessible.

Normally this would not be of particular interest however in January of 2014 a writer of Cannon in an interview stated that her finished works should have ended differently. She agreed with the fannon writers that two of her characters should have gotten together instead of the pairing she wrote. Even this would have only been of interest in passing; however her finished work included an epilogue that was set nineteen years after the events of the books; on September 1st, 2017, a date which had not happened yet. By publicly stating that her written future timeline was not what should happen before the actual date in question had passed in her world she nearly tore the fabric of reality with the pressures of fannon vs. cannon. This event sent shock waves across the multiverse and every fanon world containing this pairing suddenly became much easier to find and the cannon universe was suddenly no longer locked into authorial fiat and could be changed by outside forces working for a better resolution. Normally scripted events could not be changed and Operatives working in Cannon universes needed to work behind the scenes and after the resolution of the original stories. This author had opened up her world to be manipulated by forces both malevolent and benign.


	2. Chapter 2

Two years before nineteen years later. Chapter 2

The doors of the Dora's bridge open silently and a petite figure enters. She is wearing what appears to be a fairly mundane set of 20th century clothing, Capri pants with white Keds and a blue button up blouse. Her casual clothing sets her in stark relief against the futuristic background and general state of undress of the ship's crew.

"Commodore Burroughs on the bridge!" Sang the voice of Dora, almost as one, the four redheads manning the stations on the deck stand and salute, Hilda allows herself a small smile at their antics before assuming a stern countenance and returning their salute. "At ease! Captain Long, Report!" she orders as she strides forward to take the vacated command chair the displaced 'captain' sitting on her right.

The Dora is captained by the twin sisters of Lazarus Long; Lapis Lazuli and Lorelei Lee Long; the two are genetic clones of Lazarus with an extra X to replace his Y gene. Though they have captained the ship for more than a century of biological time they appear to be just past the flush of youth and no one would ever guess after gazing upon their largely nude forms that each had been a mother multiple times. The twins when not on deck tend to switch roles frequently and have a penchant for completing each others sentences. However this behavior was against regulations when Hilda was aboard. Laz (it was an even day) began her status report.

"We have achieved geosynchronous orbit above the UK and are in full stealth mode. With the additions to Dora provided by Glenda and Mobyas Toras our scanners are able to penetrate the wards hiding the shopping center off Charing Cross rd, as well as the wards around what we believe to be the castle in question in Scotland. The Scottish wards appear to have a component that interferes with electromagnetic fields and would likely prevent most basic electronic devices from working. Other wards we have found in our scan of the UK have not turned up this issue. Dr. Burroughs theory was correct in this case, it's not that magic interferes with electricity; it's that Hogwarts has a ward to do just that. Gay Deceiver won't have any issues of course since she is almost completely solid state and her electronic parts are all hardened and shielded as well as being enhanced by Glenda."

As Laz was giving her report, Lor brought up onscreen a map of the UK showing warded areas highlighted and zooming in on the areas in question. Surprisingly, or perhaps not, Buckingham palace was quite heavily warded as were several castles and estates that were considered tourist attractions to the average citizen of the UK.

"The Muggle repelling wards have been identified and are as Glenda read in her book. Though we aren't technically magical ourselves we shouldn't be affected since we've spent so many years in Oz. Other than testing our ability to penetrate a fidelius charm, there isn't much more the scanners can do to analyze the energy readings we are picking up without more information on what they may be trying to do. They are just too varied not to mention some of them can only be expressed in base 7 or base 13 according to Glenda and we don't know which ones. The base three wards were of course simplicity itself since Dora runs on a Trinary system."

"Excellent work ladies," said Hilda with a smile. "Have we been able to ascertain where on the spectrum this reality appears?"

Deety, or as she is more formally known Dr. Dejah Thoris Burroughs-Carter-Long; Hilda's daughter in law, sister wife and confidant was working Astrogation and replied "All indications are that this is the base of a rather large hub of subset realities, Dora parsed _Teh-plus_ and _Teh-minus_ and found realities with basic and extreme variants of this one but this reality seems to have no neighbors along any other axis that contain the Wizarding world. During the survey Dora compared the reality cross section to a database of over 700,000 established variant worlds and found more than 29,000 close matches to fanon realities. This one, designated _Teh-Zero_ is a perfect match for cannon in all the data points we searched for. There are even some rather bizarre irregularities with the local calendar that appear to have no explanation other than Authorial Fiat."

"Good, so this _is_ the lynchpin world then. Changes here will propagate along the spectrum and increase the probability of positive or negative outcomes" confirmed Hilda with a decisive nod. "Are there any issues that could affect the mission now that we have isolated the target reality?"

The fourth member of the bridge crew Elizabeth Andrew Jackson "Libby" Long appeared to be a twin to Deety and like her near twin was a lightning calculator with an inherent understanding of certain types of mathematics, the two of them switched out astrogator and sciences almost as often as Laz and Lor changed who was captain.

"Upon close examination to determine mission parameters Dora discovered that this is a reciprocal reality and that despite her age at the point of insertion Hermione has copies of novels detailing our lives up until the creation of the Circle of Ouroboros. This could either simplify or complicate our mission depending on her reaction to our offer." Libby offered.

"Indications are that she is very well read especially for someone of her age and her parents tend to vacation abroad, so she is probably fully capable of the mental flexibility required to comprehend world-as-myth especially since she has accepted that magic in some form at least is real." Countered Deety

"Hmph, we'll have to see about that" said Hilda with a slight frown, "I never liked using probabilities to predict reactions without a thorough and true personality profile. How go our insertion preparations? Have we received word from our on the ground teams?"

"The Wizard, using the name Oscar Diggs, has established a Gringotts account and changed some gold for Galleons and has proceeded to purchase a large library of materials from both England and abroad. He and Dorothy are currently using a small magical community in Minnesota as a base while collecting everything they can on Native American magic and anything available on modern magical theory and advances that were banned by the British ministry. Dorothy has had a wonderful time exploring a more modern America though she seems particularly fond of Lake Wobegon, the town they have settled in."

"Minerva is exploring Egyptian Greek and Roman magical communities with Gillian, Dorcas and Patty are somewhere near Tibet. Patty has discovered that her ability to communicate with her snakes through her grok of Martian has in this reality become Parseltongue. From her last transmission, she is studying eastern magics; Chakra, Reiki and Chi, since they are more about energy manipulation rather than spell casting."

"Zeb is down in Australia; since he did a tour there in his home reality he is familiar with the geography, though several of the communities are different since there was no war. Apparently his unusual luck and danger sense would have translated to him being magical were he from this reality. So he is making inroads with the aborigines and expatriate magicals down under."

"Gay Deceiver can have all of them picked up within the next hour if you wish captain," offered Dora, sensing Hilda's mood.

"Yes, let's have everyone meet in the lounge in an hour, give each team enough t time to allow them to finish their ongoing projects but assemble everyone in an hour ships time."

* * *

The Gay Deceiver began its life as an electric flying car, specifically a 1979 Ford Duo made in a Canada far, far in advance of Harry Potter's world, however not too long thereafter a large percentage of its internal components were replaced by parts liberated from the Australian Defense forces. This upgrade was performed almost exclusively by her owner Captain Zebadiah J. Carter. Later his wife Deety performed significant computer upgrades to the car and her father, Dr. Jacob Burroughs installed his recently invented Burroughs Continua Device. This device, about the size of a sewing machine, allowed a properly programmed Gay to navigate the various realities that make up the multiverse, his n dimensional equations also indicated the ability to navigate time, but he disabled that capability due to fear of paradox. While Deety worked on Gay's computer upgrades, she recruited the assistance of her new stepmother Hilda "Sharpie" Corners-Burroughs whose contralto voice was similar enough to Gay's original voice to add a bit of personalization.

Later the four humans and their increasingly intelligent flying car began to tour the multiverse finding themselves more often than not in worlds familiar to them in the form of favorite books. From the Dead Sea bottoms of Barsoom, to the palace of Glinda The Good in Oz, they traveled, eventually settling down with the Long family on _Tellus Tertius._ Of course that was more than a century ago, and when you have the resources of several genius level intellects and the oldest paranoid old coot in the multiverse at your disposal it is to be expected that Gay would look a bit different. At her core of course she is still a Ford Duo.

Being a 40th century gal now Gay didn't rely on radar and infrared for her autopilot and proximity awareness, though she still had the old style systems available as a redundancy, Hell, she had redundant systems for her redundant systems and three separate memory storage banks as well as a backup on the Dora. When making an entrance, using the continua device, she was able to simply appear after 'bouncing' 10,000 feet above a projected landing site and scanning it thoroughly. However Gay was originally a 20th century gal and her personality was based on a fairly sassy ex girlfriend of Zeb's so why appear in a blink when you can mess around a bit. That is why a startled Zeb Carter-Long found himself hearing a thrumming sound as he watched a blue British police box appear slowly out of thin air.

* * *

Authors Note: Characters mentioned above can be found in Robert A. Heinlein's "Time Enough For Love" "The Number of the Beast" "The Cat Who Walks Through Walls" and "Stranger in a Strange Land" and L. Frank Baum's "The Wonderful Wizard of Oz" All of which Hermione or her parents have a copy of... :)


End file.
